Friday, March 11, 2011

EARTHSHAAAAAAKE!

Every time there's an earthquake, I think of Ducky from The Land Before Time (the original) yelling, "Earrthshaaaaaaake!"

Husband and I are okay. I'm still waiting to hear from a few friends, but most of the people I know have already made an appearance on Facebook to say they're all right too.

In case you live under a rock with internet access, you probably heard about this earthquake already. At 3pm this afternoon, an earthquake with an 8.9 magnitude happened off the coast northeast of Tokyo. That's a greater magnitude than either Haiti or Chile. It was felt as far away as Beijing, China.

At time of writing, all phones are down and all public transportation has stopped. Husband is stranded at work, he's staying with a friend until the trains are running again. We are very fortunate that we are on the southwest of Tokyo and still have power and gas (and internet!).

Some of our spice rack ended up in the kitchen sink, shelves staged a coup and threw off their contents, my desk lamp took a dive, and a full-length mirror fell over upstairs (but didn't break). I'm lucky our giant bookshelf didn't fall over.

It was scary, especially since the aftershocks kept coming for another couple hours, but I didn't realize how bad it was in other places until I started checking the news feeds. I am fortunate and grateful.

Update: I've heard from almost all of my friends in Japan and they're all okay. Some are stranded at work, but they're okay. The phones are working again, but the trains may be shut down until tomorrow. Husband is staying at a friend's house tonight and will drive home tomorrow.

Thank god for the internet. I could get and receive emails, Skype with immediate family, and keep tabs on friends.

Update: Husband drove home the next day as planned, we were only apart for approximately 24 hours. We spent the weekend playing video games (him) and watching news feeds (me).